The young as patients and doctors

“Youth, even in its sorrows, always has a brilliancy of its own,” said Victor Hugo. This BMJ supports Hugo, not that he needs it—dead and immortal as he is.

Beginning with the very young, two paediatricians consider the common problem of trying to work out whether a child who is slow to talk at 18–24 months is normal (p 836). Most are, but there are few validated milestones to be used in such circumstances. The paediatricians turned to television and show that by 18 months 96% of apparently normal children could recognise …